BarleyDark Farm???

[sophiextime]

Ok i came across BarleyDark Farm while playing Skyrim SE. I am guessing its a farm added by a mod, most likely Cutting Room Floor. I am not certain which mod but its a farm with 2 farmers and cows, chickens goats and 2 dogs. Its on the path between Whiterun and Rorikstead.

 

Now what puzzles me is why this farm has been placed there so close to a hostile spot? There is ALWAYS hostiles wolves, giants, sabrecats and bandits close to there.

 

So i am passing and 3 wolves and one bandit basically ruin the place. they slaughter all the cows, chickens and both dogs. I think one goat escaped.

 

so....why??? why on this good skyrim earth put a farm there? lol

 

So if it is cutting room floor, does that make it a bethesda original idea that cutting room floor adds but was not placed in the default game? In a way i can see why Bethesda decided to remove it because its so sad watching a cool farm get obliterated.

 

Now its just a farmhouse with 2 people and no animals :(.

[ToJKa]

Ah, yes. The Suicidus Farm ?

 

Yes, that's from Cutting Room Floor, and i've wondered the same thing. And yes, probably why it was cut in the first place.

[Grey Cloud]

2 hours ago, sophiextime said:

I think one goat escaped

I'm thinking that that goat will need counselling and support*. ?

 

*There's probably a mod but whether it's available for SE?

[karlpaws]

I am not sure if the CRF team checked the playability of things they re-added but I've had issues with attacks there as well. Fewer bandits but animals certainly. I tend to see bandits, thalmor troops and other stuff farther NE toward that necromancer's altar.

 

Do you have any random spawn adding mods? I've found those can really play havok with other added locations. One added a random spawn inside a building added by Granite Hill.

[mordantkitten]

I've only seen one farmer, Mithorpa Nasyal, the dark elf. I looked in the house and nobody was there. Who's the other one?

[nemocdt]

On 7/23/2018 at 11:13 PM, sophiextime said:

Ok i came across BarleyDark Farm while playing Skyrim SE. I am guessing its a farm added by a mod, most likely Cutting Room Floor. I am not certain which mod but its a farm with 2 farmers and cows, chickens goats and 2 dogs. Its on the path between Whiterun and Rorikstead.

 

Now what puzzles me is why this farm has been placed there so close to a hostile spot? There is ALWAYS hostiles wolves, giants, sabrecats and bandits close to there.

 

So i am passing and 3 wolves and one bandit basically ruin the place. they slaughter all the cows, chickens and both dogs. I think one goat escaped.

 

so....why??? why on this good skyrim earth put a farm there? lol

 

So if it is cutting room floor, does that make it a bethesda original idea that cutting room floor adds but was not placed in the default game? In a way i can see why Bethesda decided to remove it because its so sad watching a cool farm get obliterated.

 

Now its just a farmhouse with 2 people and no animals :(.

i also have immerrsive patrols, populated skyrim nightmare edition, obis and a civil war encounters mod,  Barley dark farm is the flash point for combat insanity. i love it. at lower levels i avoided the F?@k out of that area between bloated mans grotto and fort greymoor, but 9/10 times there a war going on at barley dark. i also get cultists spawning there.

[sophiextime]

poor poor farmers hahaha. i bet they settled there thinking, " ya know, this seems like a nice secluded spot. we could set up a small farm and tend to the ocassional passing traveller, what could possibly go wrong?"

[worik]

As far as I know, they placed the farm at the same spot that was originally intended by Bugthesda. Their idea was to go through the published but unfinished parts of Skyrim and "unhide" what they find.

 

A nearby spawn point strikes some other unhidden locations, too. And of course modded locations.

Not uncommon.

[SmedleyDButler]

I wonder what the easiest fix is for this. (for those who don't want barleydark farm to be a warzone, lol)

[worik]

3 minutes ago, SmedleyDButler said:

I wonder what the easiest fix

Maybe adding the right faction to the farm inhabitants in the *.esp ?

[SmedleyDButler]

7 minutes ago, worik said:

Maybe adding the right faction to the farm inhabitants in the *.esp ?

Hmmmm.... Which faction though? CrimeFactionWhiterun or a town faction like TownRoriksteadFaction or TownWhiterunFaction?

[y_sengaku]

4 hours ago, SmedleyDButler said:

I wonder what the easiest fix is for this. (for those who don't want barleydark farm to be a warzone, lol)

 

You can install some border gate mod like Hold Borders Consistency Patch (and its requirement, Immersive Hold Borders) to set the border gate SW of the farm with a few garrisoning guards. They can fight off a pack of wolves or even a sablecat, but are not enough to defend the border against the invading army added by Immersive Patrols who are supposedly bound for Fort Greymoor (NE to the farm). From a point of political maps of Skyrim, Barleydark is situated in the relatively lawless (even less in vanilla) frontier area between Falkreath and Whiterun that is destined to fall victim to invadors from the former in order to earn some time to enforce the defence at the fort. 

 

Alternatively, you may be worth considering the possibility of rolling IP from 2.2.0 to 2.0.3 back. The latest LE build (2.2.0) imported some new features from SE, and put too much emphasis on the rather large-scale siege between the added armies at fort (for my taste).  If I remember correctly, the armies of the earlier version was not so strong and it was relatively rare occurance to happen the direct skirmish between the patrolls.

[SmedleyDButler]

3 hours ago, y_sengaku said:

 

You can install some border gate mod like Hold Borders Consistency Patch (and its requirement, Immersive Hold Borders) to set the border gate SW of the farm with a few garrisoning guards. They can fight off a pack of wolves or even a sablecat, but are not enough to defend the border against the invading army added by Immersive Patrols who are supposedly bound for Fort Greymoor (NE to the farm). From a point of political maps of Skyrim, Barleydark is situated in the relatively lawless (even less in vanilla) frontier area between Falkreath and Whiterun that is destined to fall victim to invadors from the former in order to earn some time to enforce the defence at the fort. 

 

Alternatively, you may be worth considering the possibility of rolling IP from 2.2.0 to 2.0.3 back. The latest LE build (2.2.0) imported some new features from SE, and put too much emphasis on the rather large-scale siege between the added armies at fort (for my taste).  If I remember correctly, the armies of the earlier version was not so strong and it was relatively rare occurance to happen the direct skirmish between the patrolls.

I don't actually use Immersive Patrols anymore, tried it for a short while, but the code's a disaster, as I've been warned several times here and elsewhere. The potential for bugs and conflict is too great for what's not really a huge gain (Open Civil War is a lot more meaty in terms of bringing in some real war content).

 

Also, that sounds way more complex than adding factions or even just a Protected flag, haha

[sophiextime]

yeah could there just not be a simple mod created that add a a kind of safe zone around it? like a forcefield lmao. Some way to either make the path of the twin giants that stomp through there in a diff directions or even just removes them. The giants in fact are fairly passive in my game unless you provoke them but i always see them suddenly go nuts at a sabrecat or wolves ad then all hell breaks loose. the cows get squished, chickens slaughtered and the 2 farmdogs bullied. Everytime i start to approach this farm i get anxious and often end up in some kind of domestic farm chaotic scrap fight, desperate to defend the innocent farm.

[karlpaws]

10 hours ago, sophiextime said:

yeah could there just not be a simple mod created that add a a kind of safe zone around it? like a forcefield lmao. Some way to either make the path of the twin giants that stomp through there in a diff directions or even just removes them. The giants in fact are fairly passive in my game unless you provoke them but i always see them suddenly go nuts at a sabrecat or wolves ad then all hell breaks loose. the cows get squished, chickens slaughtered and the 2 farmdogs bullied. Everytime i start to approach this farm i get anxious and often end up in some kind of domestic farm chaotic scrap fight, desperate to defend the innocent farm.

I suspect one way you could do this is editing the navmesh so there is no way to the farm for NPCs (which would mean followers couldn't go into the house with you) or leave a narrow path from the road (would exclude giants, but others might find a way around to kill the cows and chickens).

 

The other way might be to remove the animals from the prey faction (if they are, I think that's what makes most npcs attack rabbits, foxes and deer) and possibly add the farmer NPC to some Captives faction that makes him ignored by everyone.

[SmedleyDButler]

5 hours ago, karlpaws said:

I suspect one way you could do this is editing the navmesh so there is no way to the farm for NPCs (which would mean followers couldn't go into the house with you) or leave a narrow path from the road (would exclude giants, but others might find a way around to kill the cows and chickens).

 

The other way might be to remove the animals from the prey faction (if they are, I think that's what makes most npcs attack rabbits, foxes and deer) and possibly add the farmer NPC to some Captives faction that makes him ignored by everyone.

Yeah, faction changes or flags seem to be the best suggestion. Also you could just edit them in the Cutting Room Floor .esp instead of requiring a new one.

 

If anyone's certain of the best changes then I think I'd just go with that. I would prefer them to be ignored than to be invincible (i.e. protected), but invincible is better than nothing.

[karlpaws]

I removed CRF from my last playthrough and haven't terribly missed it. 

 

I would say that yes, an edit to CRF's esp would be the way to do it, with a note of course about it.  I don't know what Arthmoor's rules on edits and redistribution are, but sharing a personal version might be what you'd need to do.

 

Captive factions might not be ignored by everyone, so you'd need to check what the relationships and behaviors are for the soldiers, though the giants should be ok...  probably. The good thing is the captive factions are vanilla, so you could add them to "new" NPCs in mods or set "new" factions as neutral to them in the mods that add or edit them.

[nemocdt]

On 9/26/2018 at 4:40 PM, sophiextime said:

yeah could there just not be a simple mod created that add a a kind of safe zone around it? like a forcefield lmao. Some way to either make the path of the twin giants that stomp through there in a diff directions or even just removes them. The giants in fact are fairly passive in my game unless you provoke them but i always see them suddenly go nuts at a sabrecat or wolves ad then all hell breaks loose. the cows get squished, chickens slaughtered and the 2 farmdogs bullied. Everytime i start to approach this farm i get anxious and often end up in some kind of domestic farm chaotic scrap fight, desperate to defend the innocent farm.

 

you could edit the farmer stats so he's an absolute mother fucker to fight. kind of like anise, maybe a lowkey retired rambo green beret type.

or use leadership power to make him a follower give him weapons, armour and spells then tell him to leave but wait here.

[SmedleyDButler]

17 hours ago, nemocdt said:

 

you could edit the farmer stats so he's an absolute mother fucker to fight. kind of like anise, maybe a lowkey retired rambo green beret type.

or use leadership power to make him a follower give him weapons, armour and spells then tell him to leave but wait here.

And also arm the farm animals too, right?

 

Also the farmer has a default cowardly fight style (runs and hides), so if he's a retired Green Beret, he's got some bad PTSD.

[nemocdt]

2 hours ago, SmedleyDButler said:

And also arm the farm animals too, right?

 

Also the farmer has a default cowardly fight style (runs and hides), so if he's a retired Green Beret, he's got some bad PTSD.

 it's your RP not mine. ? just throwing ideas around. when i get a chance i'm turning the farm into stormcloak underground railway for nord refuggee's escaped from thalmor persecution. protected by a retired elite guard of stormcloak special forces.  or not, fuck him if he can't protect his farm from poachers. 

[sophiextime]

CRF should have really put the farm where that old ruined building is opposite the tower where you first meet dragon when playing the main quest near Whiterun. But have it appear after that dragon fight mission or the dragon would destroy it likely. Then the farm would be away from the path of so many hostiles AND get Whiterun guard protection from the guards opposite who are guarding that tower. Would also give that old ruined cottage a story or reason for being there.

[SmedleyDButler]

3 minutes ago, sophiextime said:

CRF should have really put the farm where that old ruined building is opposite the tower where you first meet dragon when playing the main quest near Whiterun. But have it appear after that dragon fight mission or the dragon would destroy it likely. Then the farm would be away from the path of so many hostiles AND get Whiterun guard protection from the guards opposite who are guarding that tower. Would also give that old ruined cottage a story or reason for being there.

I think there's a lot of mods that like to play with that cottage though, so the chances of conflict would be high.

[worik]

33 minutes ago, sophiextime said:

CRF should have really put the farm where

As far as I understood their concept, they only revived things that Bugthesda had already put in the game. ... as far as they could decipher the artefacts.

That implies, the location is most probably not their choice.

?

[SmedleyDButler]

16 hours ago, worik said:

As far as I understood their concept, they only revived things that Bugthesda had already put in the game. ... as far as they could decipher the artefacts.

That implies, the location is most probably not their choice.

?

 

I'm beginning to suspect that this problem is probably why the farm was cut in the first place.

[EinarrTheRed]

Bit late to add to this but I've been thinking about doing my own mod adding in Barleydark Farm and Granite Hills (/Halls Bethesda couldn't make up their mind what is named either).  For mine, they won't be inhabited, instead they will be ruins.  If you dig into the CW scripting and some of the depricated dialog you find that there is scripting for battles at all of the hold capitals.  Originally Bethesda wanted the civil war to be something the player would actively fight in at various cities and towns, and these battles would have been radiant, meaning if helped take a town for one side, the other side might take it back and you'd have to assault it a second time; it would have been more like a real war.  All that got cut because apparently they couldn't make it work and it also would have rapidly depopulated Skyrim (if you think a few vampires or a dragon are bad for killing NPCs, try 30 soldiers on a rampage).  But if you really dig into it, they also had planned there to be a massacre at Granite Hills, so it would have started out as a town and then been destroyed.  There's even unused dialog referencing to that.  In fact, there's evidence that instead of Ulfric and Tullius arguing about a massacre at Karthwasten (for which there is zero evidence a battle was even fought there), there's unused dialog of the two of them arguing over who was to blame for the massacre at Granite Hills.  That dialog can be re-activated by literally changing just one variable, and one more to disable the dialog about Karthwasten.

 

All that gave me the idea for a mod in which Granite Hills exists but is destroyed (along with Barleydark) and then the player gets rumors about it and maybe some side quests looking for evidence of who was at fault, was it the Stormcloaks, the Imperials, Alduin or someone else... its a mystery.

 

As for what Arthmoor did in CRF, he did the same thing I'm doing, the only thing left in vanilla Skyrim of either location is the Location Reference file which tells us which exterior cells Bethesda had planned to use.  For Barleydark its just two cells between the road and the Nord puzzle tomb (and a hand cart).  For Granite Hills its four cells right around the crossroads.  There's another location that was cut that doesn't even have a location reference file, the village of Oakwood which should have been in Falkreath, my best guess is it would have been at the unnamed grave site where you have six graves and 2 undead skeletons by Lake Ilinalta just north of Shriekwind.   But to be clear, there are no disabled buildings or things hidden away that Arthmoor re-enabled.  What he did in CRF was look at the game lore from Arena and what little info there is in the Skryim.esm and rebuilt the farm from scratch.

 

There's not much lore about when it happened.  Here's what is known as official lore gleaned from various sources:

• Granite Hills (Granitehalls in Arena and is officially part of Whiterun Hold.
• There has been a settlement there dating back to the 1E, its name in Dragon Tongue is QuethSeGol Ahrol which I make out to translate as Hill of the Earthbones)
• At some point Imperial forces moved from Falkreath into Granite Hills and occupied it.
• This was after Siddgeir had become Jarl of Falkreath.
• According to Dengeir he was Jarl, "not long ago" but we have no exact date for when the change of Jarls took place.
• Siddgeir has dialog in which he is expecting an official to arrive from Granite Hills with the annual taxes (of course that individual never arrives).
• There is unused dialog between Tullius and Ulfric at the peace summit at High Hrothgar where they argue about who was responsible for the massacre at Granite Hills (with full voice acting).

 

From that I pieced it together as follows:

"Not long ago" might be just 2 or 3 years ago.  So Siddgeir became Jarl around197, 4E

Imperial troops moved into Granite Hills the following year in 198 4E and began fortifying it.

In Mid-year 201, a force of Stormcloaks, possibly with the assistance of the Jarl of Whiterun (his involvement isn't known for certain, part of the mystery) attacked the Imperials at Granite Hills.   No one knows exactly what happened next but at some point the town was set ablaze.  There were no survivors among either the townsfolk, the attacking Stormcloaks or the defending Imperials.  Word would have spread slowly so by Last Seed 201 (when game play begins with a carriage ride to Helgen) news of the massacre hasn't yet reached the nearby hold Capitals.  (Remember, Granite Hills is Whiterun territory that has been seized by Imperial troops for Falkreath; and that adds much more context to why Proventus would worry moving Whiterun Guards to Riverwood might be viewed as a preparation for attack by the Jarl of Falkreath who would be right to worry about retaliation in this scenario.)

 

What's interesting is that this would have been one of two major setbacks for the Imperials in that area.  The only land route from Cyrodiil into Skyrim is through Falkreath via Bruma, and that goes right through Helgen were we know the Legion had a garrison.  If they could have fortified Granite Hills, they would have controlled both main points of access between Falkreath and Skyrim giving them a firm grip on that Hold.  Granite Hills would have also given them control of the crossroads leading to Markarth, which would help them improve their supply lines to that city (though they'd still have to deal with Forsworn raids beyond that point but then they could have sent patrols from both ends).  From Granite Hills they could have occupied Rorikstead next and had a land link to Solitude, which would have further improved their grip on all of Western Skyrim and that would have likely spelled the end of the Stormcloaks.  But we know Alduin destroyed Helgen, and that badly hurt the Legion, now with Granite Hills gone as well that likely means their entire garrison in that hold had been wiped out which would have been quite a blow to their troop strength and plans. 

 

Anyway, just thought the fellow lorists might find it interesting.  I'm still tinkering with the idea of a mod built around this, but its not past the concept stage.